How the modern tendency to "nosh" endlessly on tons of out-and-out crap at every available opportunity relates to "Vanity" I cannot imagine. If any anything, other than pointing to the huge success "Bernaysian" advertising techniques have enjoyed in pandering to human weakness, it indicates a tremendous lack of proper self-esteem –– a desirable quality that should never be confused with morbid egocentrism.

I sensed both "Still Life" and "Old Master," Ducky, but what all that has to do with Vanity I still don't understand. Why is it called "The Vanitas School of Funerary Art?"

Who contrives these names and categories to help us define, remember –– and presumably understand –– Art better?

I doubt very much if our friend Willem Hedda thought of himself as a practitioner of "Funerary Art of the Vanitas School," any more than J.S. Bach regarded himself as "The Culmination of the Baroque Period" in Music, so how do these curious academic designations come about?

Gratuitous Displays of Extraneous Knowledge Offered Not To Shed Light Or Enhance the Discussion, But For The Primary Purpose Of Giving An Impression Of Superiority are obnoxiously SELF-AGGRANDIZING, and therefore, Subject to Removal at the Discretion of the Censor-in-Residence.